In the first two lessons we learned from Covid-19, we were outside, looking at the services we take for granted even now, though they are not and paid like they didn't matter. We move inside now to the service we all have come to appreciate and rely on more than ever. Hospitals are the linchpin of what is being done against the pandemic. And yet, there are lessons to be learned even here after we learned some already.
One thing that must bug everyone including hospital staff is the selective memory of politicians; or their utter lack of knowledge of how a hospital is run and what it takes to keep one going. There are doctors and nurses; no disrespect, you'll be widely ignored in this article in favor of others in your hospital. What needs saying is that both doctors and nurses are vastly underpaid for what they do normally; and now it is plain ridiculous considering the pressure of a pandemic in winter.
For doctors to function, nurses are irreplaceable; someone put up a picture in social media with a terribly complicated array of tubes and small machines all intended for one patient. The caption was 'thank you nurses for installing all this when doctors don't know where to start putting this together'.
But there are the pharmacists, the porters, the cleaners, the janitors, the security, and a host of other good people all doing their bit in the teeth of the pandemic; they're as exposed to the virus as any doctor or nurse, yet they have been edited out by politicians for being to complicated to mention; and nobody should know that they, too, function on minimal wages. Is anyone seriously surprised they quit as soon as possible?
The low wages in hospitals have an easy reason: Politicians have starved the hospitals of cash while at the same time introducing more and more red tape and so called management. The result was and is that hospitals have less money for the frontline and at the same time have to add non-essential administration jobs to comply with all the worthless information ministers require only to make themselves look good.
It is a fact that can be seen now during Covid-19, that not having a health system, like the US, or one that is systematically dismantled by shortening money to the point where it barely works on fair weather days, is the main reason why the economy collapsed. Had there been reserves in the health system, then reserves in the population could have been shielded better.
Covid-19 isn't the killer, politicians since 1919 are the killers. Despite the Spanish Flu and its lessons to humanity, they soon started to reassign money to more important things than being prepared; like upping their own income, paying themselves higher expenses, and increasing their useless travel mileage.
Two decisions come readily to hand: One was British parliament denying hungry children food while at the same time increasing their own overpaid wages. The other was the shameful show in the US Capitol where billions were pumped into private companies that don't even pay real taxes while denying the workless population a drop of money to enable them to pay rent and buy some food.
Is it a wonder that people despise politicians? Nobody trusts their lying faces. No one can take anything they say seriously. They are a posse of work-shy individuals with only one goal: Shovel as much money into their own pockets at the expense of whoever and whatever. Despicable me? Despicable them. Don't give a politician a hand in greeting, they carry ugly bugs.
Further reading
Covid-19 Lesson 2
Covid-19 Lesson 1
Spanish Flu and Covid-19
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